There have been so many times during this house-building process where we would have loved to have had more help. The trouble with this was, we didn't have the wherewithal to organize said helping, nor necessarily the skills needed to show said helpers what to do. And during the time we'd spend organizing the help and showing the helpers what to do (if we happened to already know), we could have accomplished the task already. So, it was often easier and less stressful to fumble around by ourselves.

But oh how I wished someone would swoop in, someone who needed zero direction and zero organizing, someone who could tell us what to do. And so it was the other day when Charlie (either because he is amazing, or really bored, or really generous, or really worried about The Maple Hill 'Hood slipping at our very doorstep, or some combination of all four..) casually informed us that "If you buy the gravel, I'll make a walkway for the front of your house." We were both a little stunned, and very, very touched!

Charlie's suggestion aimed to rectify the fact that the front of our house is steeply sloped, and can be a bit dangerous. While we'd love to fix the problem, there are always more pressing projects to tackle before the imminent arrival of winter. And so, what a gift it is to have Charlie swoop in to make one for us! We did as we were told and bought a load of stone. And Charlie, meanwhile, spent an afternoon shoveling, wheel-barrowing, and raking gravel until we had an honest-to-goodness flat spot in front of our house!